Raking Leaves Part 1 and Francophilia

How truly gorgeous is autumn.  It’s breathtaking, in every sense of the word.  I mean do people know about this?  Do people know how freaking beautiful it is?  The leaves and the crisp air and the leaves and the pumpkins and the leaves… I feel like I have struck gold with this autumn thing.  Oh beauteous nature, what wonder you share with man.  Makes me want to write poems and dance with wands made of glitter and dried leaves.

Post bike ride yesterday I was feeling ambitious and somewhat on top of life after a personal revelation so I decided to rake the leaves in the backyard.  Now, I haven’t raked leaves since about 1995 and even then I wouldn’t call my leaf raking experience true raking.  I was 12 at the time and I probably half-assedly pushed a rake around our massive yard, clearing one path from the front porch to the sidewalk so I could continue my imaginative game of frolicking through the leaf castle maze like an autumnal princess.  Anyway, I was sure at 30 I could handle a small backyard.   Nope.  I was wrong.  About twenty minutes into the endeavor I had only raked a quarter of the yard and I was sweating profusely even though it was a cool 58 degrees outside.  My obliques were screaming and I was getting strange pains in my wrists (Am I holding the rake right?  Is there are right way to hold a rake?  Good God, the neighbors are probably laughing at me from the comforts of their living room while a wood fire burns and they sip delicious, warm pumpkin-flavored mochas...)  Finally, after what seemed like hours but was probably only 30 minutes I looked around and had 5 decently sized piles of leaves, twigs, and those damn Black Walnuts…and I had raked only half the yard.  You have got to be kidding me.  Then I realized I have a larger problem – where do I dump all of these leaves?  When I was a kid we used to rake the leaves to the curb** and the piles of golden browns and burnt reds would mysteriously disappear after a few days.  So maybe I have to haul all of these leaves to the front of the house and dump them curbside.  But didn’t I read something last week in the town newspaper that said leaf pile pick up didn’t start until October 14^th?  Or did I make that up?  I mean I was practically sleepwalking all last week so it’s quite possible I dreamt it…but no one else has piles of leaves on their curb.  There is a compost pile in the backyard…but aren’t compost piles illegal?  Something about not being able to burn leaves on your property…?  But if you’re not going to burn the leaves then what’s the harm in dumping them all in one massive pile of deceased nature? 

Now I’m at a loss.  Do I drag the piles of leaves to the front yard and dump them curbside, risking the possibility of strong winds blowing them all across creation?  Or do I dump them in the “compost” pile in the backyard that may or may not be illegal?  I don’t know what to do and I feel like a total Californian for not knowing what to do with raked leaves.  My dead ancestors are probably laughing at me.

Side note:  It smells like soup in this store.  Ohhh the guy behind me is eating Chinese food.  Why does the Chinese takeout smell like soup?  Chicken bouillon?  Wait, that’s not how you make Lo Mein…hmm suspect. 

This whole raking leaves thing is humiliating considering I was raised in the Northeast so I drop the rake in the middle of the yard, abandon the leaf piles, pray there are no strong winds in the next 24 hours, and decide to take a hot shower in hopes of washing away the embarrassment of this experience.  Plus there’s probably pumpkin-flavored something or other inside that will restore my admiration for autumn…and the leaves.

One other thing I noticed yesterday before I decided to have it out with the leaves in the backyard – on my long bike ride yesterday afternoon I rode by a mailbox that was painted in the same fashion as the French flag.  Oh wow!  These people must be real Francophiles if they live in the middle of the country and painted their mailbox to look like France’s flag.  Good for them!  They must be extremely cultured and love old, moldy cheese.  Maybe I can befriend them and then I’ll be invited over to discuss the differences between Gauguin and Monet, how only REAL champagne comes from the region of Champagne, and how absolutely disgusting the light display on the Eiffel Tower is.  I bet they have amazing art, smoke heavily, and eat baguettes at every meal while maintaining slender figures.  I was already planning the wine trip to Bordeaux with my new Francophile besties when I glanced at the house the mailbox belonged to and noticed they had a giant American flag hanging from the porch.  Wait…they’re not Francophiles, they’re Amurricans who painted their mailbox red, white and blue and HAPPENED to get the order wrong.  Blast.  I should have known better.  My dreams of living like Zelda Fitzgerald in Paris circa 1921 crushed.  The wheels of Brie and endless bottles of rich, oaky reds - GONE.  Le sigh.  Guess I’ll HAVE to settle for pumpkin spice lattes, apple pies, pizza…beer…baseball…tailgates…FIREWORKS… omg JOHN PHILLIPS SOUSA MARCHES.  FREEDOM.  I just got so friggin’ excited about America.  Maybe I’ll go out and rake more leaves now and then paint the mailbox.  In the correct color order of course.

**When I was younger I remember this suburban legend about a kid playing in a leaf pile curbside who gets run over by a truck or a car or some massive piece of machinery all because he was diving in and out of the leaf pile and it was difficult to see him.  I’m fairly certain this was a tale made up by suburban moms (much like how eating cookie dough will make you sick because of the raw eggs) to deter kids from messing up the perfectly swept piles of leaves.  File under “Lies My Parents Told Me.”